Last Saturday and Sunday, April 4th to 5th, about 50 motocross riders participated in the first 24 hour long endurance race….on electric motorcycles. The event, 24 Hours of Electricross, was hosted by Zero Motorcycles, the creators of the Zero X motorcycle, an off-road electric bike, and the soon-to-come Zero S street legal motorcycle. From 11 a.m. on Saturday to 11 a.m. on Sunday, 10 teams competed to see which could complete the most laps on one Zero X motorcycle. With a maximum of 3 batteries, the teams had to consider their speed, use of their braking systems, and how often to switch out and charge their batteries. As the motorcycles are all electric, their energy consumption compared to gas-powered bikes is amazingly low. In fact, only $100 worth of electricity was needed to power all 10 bikes for the entire race. To make the event even cleaner, Akeena Solar provided solar charging stations on Saturday.

I was lucky enough to check out the race down at the San Jose fair grounds Sunday morning. The riders and the Zero Motorcycles staff were plenty tired by that time but the leading team Hotchalk was just shy of breaking 1000 laps – or 500 miles. The 10 teams came from the San Francisco Bay Area, New Mexico, even Canada and the UK. And all told, the race was the largest of its kind (in fact, it was the first of its kind) and set the Guinness World Record for the largest all-electric off road race. Each team was formed around one Zero X motorcycle and the love of electric bikes.

I chatted with Scott Snaith, the captain of the 50 Cycles team who came all the way from England to participate in the race. Snaith and 50cycles.com are soon to be dealers for the Zero motorcycles in the UK. He said, “We’ve been selling bikes for about five years…this is the sort of technology we’ve been waiting for in regards to the battery technology and the motor.”

Given that the bikes are electric (and therefore, sublimely quiet compared to gas-powered bikes), there was just a slight whir or hum around the track. The lack of noise was the reason the race was allowed to continue for 24 hours, even with the close proximity to luxury apartment buildings. And in fact, when the racing Zero X bikes were put to the test on a decibel meter, they came in below the level of normal conversation. Snaith said all the riders thought it was “nice to be able to talk during the race.”

I also got a chance to talk to Neal Saiki, the inventor and founder of Zero Motorcycles, while he was taking a bit of a break from helping out the teams make small repairs to their bikes. He said the motorcycles had been holding up really well and all the riders were still going fast (the Zero X gets up to 50 MPH top speed; and on the motocross track, most riders were getting up to about 30 MPH). Neal said, “[The event is] setting a world record and really setting a trend because you can talk to all these racers out here. They had a great time and everyone is just astounded with how fast they’re going on these motorcycles and how durable they are, lasting 24 hours. So it’s really a a great thing and without a lot of noise and no pollution, it’s really changing the way we do racing.”

Besides her green products column on Cleantech Blog, Cristina is a passionate advocate for green living at the Green Home Huddle at Huddler.com, which focuses on electric cars, organic personal care, and other green products.

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Racing vehicles for sport, from a scientific point of view, seems silly, just a lot of air being pushed around. Let's enclose the oval tracks of the big time races like NASCAR in glass tunnels and circulate air through them so the race cars can go even faster and without stopping for fuel. The world will come around to see the energy that can be saved this way eventually. See for example. I often wonder why China, with all the bike riders there in the big cities, are becoming enamored with the auto when it is elevated, enclosed bikeways that they really need to be pursuing, since that would get them a step ahead rather than staying a step behind. There are many things I wonder about. I will just go on wondering, I suppose.

I have been wanting to buy a motorscooter or motorcycle that operates on clean energy. The only thing holding me back is that there is no compartment for carrying packages like groceries.Manufacturers need to figure out some way to add on such a space before people like me will actually buy one of these.

Motocross race with the electric bike its a very interesting thing for the users and the visitors. In the race the fuel related bikes are more efficient than the electric bike, there performance is very good, for avoiding the pollution they use this type of bike for the racing. As the motorcycles are all electric, their energy consumption compared to gas-powered bikes is amazingly low.